


Masquerade

by cycnus39



Category: Batman (Comics), Iron Man (Comic), Superman/Batman (Comics)
Genre: Consent Issues, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-05
Updated: 2014-01-05
Packaged: 2018-01-07 15:45:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,056
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1121651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cycnus39/pseuds/cycnus39
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes when Bruce hopes he's on hallucinogens, he is. Other times he's not so lucky.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Masquerade

Ugh! He had the most awful sickening headache and Clark’s kisses and strokes were--

That wasn’t Clark.

Eyes snapping open, he stared at the unfamiliar bedroom wall in front of him while desperately trying to make sense of what his body was telling him.

The large hands stroking him, arousing him, had calluses and perhaps even a cut on the right thumb.

The comparatively cool lips kissing him, worshipping him, were so gentle they were almost tentative.

The expectant body pressing up close behind him was massively muscled and massively--

Scrambling forwards, he tried to roll off the bed onto the floor but his body was so slow and weak and so hopelessly tangled in the sheets that he ended up landing on his head and shoulders in an ungainly, spine jarring heap.

He couldn’t hear what the man on the bed was saying because of the blood rushing dizzily in his ears, but he felt those callused hands gently untangling the sheets from his body and he had to fight them off, had to--

He blinked, froze staring dumbly at his hands, unable to think, unable to breathe, because the hands he was staring at weren’t his at all.

“Tony?” Steve asked in alarm while crouching naked in front of him. “Are you okay?” Steve continued worriedly, but he couldn’t answer, could do nothing but sit slumped against the bed gawping at Captain America’s erection.

Okay, it wasn’t the largest erection he had ever seen, and was probably even a little smaller than Harvey’s, but there was something about its smoothness, its straightness, its downy nest of perfect blond curls that made it look like it needed its own flag, which made perfect sense because Captain America’s erection was--

“Tony! Tony, look at me,” Steve was saying urgently while taking a firm hold of his chin and lifting his head. Then he was looking into Steve’s concerned blue eyes and all he could think of was how beautiful they were and--

He blinked and found himself lying on his back, in his own bed, in his own bedroom, masturbating.

Perfect.

First a weird dream about Captain America’s penis and now sleep masturbation. One thing was clear: he going to have to tell Alfred never to serve bacon for breakfast again.

After bringing himself to a quick climax, he rolled over, dug the house phone out of the bedside cabinet drawer and called Clark.

“Hey, sweetheart, is everything okay?” Clark answered on the third ring and he didn’t know what to say. “Bruce? Are we--”

“I’m fine. I was just wondering how your interview went this morning.”

“Oh. Well, considering Mr Chang was unavailable and I ended up speaking to Luthor, it wasn’t quite the worst interview I’ve ever conducted.”

“You mean he didn’t pull out a gun and try to shoot you in the face this time.”

“Exactly. So are we still on for dinner?”

“I think Alfred’s started prepping it so we’d better be.”

“Great. I’ll be there at eight. Don’t make me dig you out of the cave again.”

“Goodbye, Clark,” he returned dryly then ended the call and tossed the phone back in the drawer.

While talking to Clark had grounded him firmly back in reality, he couldn’t help but dwell on the sheer bizarreness of his dream as he rolled out of bed then stretched the sleepiness out of his body on his way into the bathroom. The truth was he had never thought about Steve in a sexual context never mind considered what might happen in a sexual situation between Tony and Steve, so that was weird enough, but imagining himself as Tony? That was absolutely absurd.

Punching the shower on, he stepped under the cascade of hot water and reached up to grab the--

NO!

No, no, no! He wasn’t back on Tony’s bedroom floor with Steve on top of him, Steve inside him. He couldn’t be. But there was no denying the rub of carpet against his back, no denying the burst of liquid heat as Steve ejaculated inside him, no denying the rush of panic that made him kick Steve head first into the wall.

Ignoring the shower of plaster caused by Steve’s impact, he rolled clumsily to his feet, rushed into the bathroom and slammed the door shut behind him. No lock. The door had no fucking lock! There had to be something he could jam it with, something he could--

“Tony, wh-- Did I hurt you?” Steve asked confusedly, dazedly, from the other side of the door and he realised he’d probably kicked Steve all the way through the plaster into the brick.

“No, I...just felt really nauseous and didn’t want to throw up on you,” he returned in Tony’s voice, knowing it sounded incredibly lame even if he did actually have the worst sickening headache pounding against his skull. “I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

“No, but that wall rang my bell pretty good,” Steve sighed. “If you’re still feeling nauseous, tell me and I’ll call Leonard. If you’re feeling better, can you bring me a Band-Aid?”

After listening to Steve, if that was really Steve, walk away from the door to sit heavily down on the bed, he turned away from the door himself and walked up to the mirror, wasn’t surprised to find Tony’s face scowling back at him.

Okay, this had all started just a few minutes ago and, since it clearly wasn’t a dream, he had probably been overdosed with a hallucinogen or was hooked up to one of Jervis Tetch’s machines or was in an alternate reality where he really was insane and on hallucinogens or really was Tony Stark and was hooked up to one of Jervis Tetch’s machines or-- WHY WAS HIS MIND SUDDENLY LIKE A BOX OF MONKEYS ON CRYSTAL METH?

Deep breath, he needed to take a deep breath and--

“Tony?” Steve knocked on the door.

“Give me a second!” he snapped back. Were there no Band-Aids anywhere else in the apartment?

“No, Bruce is on the phone. Do you want me to--”

Bruce? Tony!

“Yes!” he yelped and dived for the door, yanked it open and grabbed the cellphone out of Steve’s hand before slamming the door shut again. “What did you do, you fucking idiot?” he snarled while retreating to the far end of the bathroom.

Silence.

For a moment, he thought maybe he was going insane, but then Tony replied in his voice, “Bruce, calm down. It’s--”

“You calm down! I just had sex with Steve!”

“Technically, I was having sex with Steve. You just interrupted.”

“Interrupted? I’m going to interrupt your breathing! What did you do?”

“It looks like we’ve swapped bodies.”

“You think?”

“Bruce--”

“Just tell me what you did and how we reverse it.”

“Hmm.”

“Hmm? What do you mean, hmm?”

“Well, last night I helped Madame Masque take the Huehuecoyotl Mask from HYDRA’s--”

If he banged his head against the wall hard enough, maybe he’d wake up in bed with Clark.

“Bruce? That’s my head you’re hitting.”

“I know.”

“So I’d like it back in one piece.”

“Okay,” he said when it seemed the wall was only making his headache worse, “last night you were thinking with your penis and helped a criminal steal a magical object from--”

“Hey, I didn’t let her keep it! I gave it to Stephen.”

“Right. But before you did that, you activated it.”

“Accidentally!”

“You shouldn’t have touched it at all!”

“I couldn’t help it and it’s not as if I touched it with my fingers.”

“Then what-- Forget it. Huehuecoyotl was an Aztec trickster god, which means the magic should be solar or lunar based as well as temporary. Is that what Stephen told you?”

“Not quite.”

“Not quite?”

“Well, he was kind of busy zapping transdimensional wafer sprites at the time.”

“So what did he say?”

“Shut the door properly on your way out.”

“Perfect.”

“But Whitney told me--”

“You’re on first name terms with Madame Masque?”

“That the mask has the power to swap souls between bodies from sun zenith to moon zenith and that the magic was temporary. She definitely said it was temporary and, since the magic kicked in just after noon, it should reverse some time tonight.”

“Okay, I’m going to call Stephen and find out exactly what we’re dealing with. You stay by the phone until I call back, understand?”

“What do you think I’m going to do? Run down to your cave and--”

“Stay there!” he repeated then ended the call and flicked through Tony’s speed dial numbers until he found Stephen’s.

The phone rang for almost thirty seconds before Stephen answered with a curt, “Be quick.”

“It’s Bruce. Tony accidentally activated the Huehuecoyotl Mask last night and we swapped bodies a few minutes ago.”

“I know,” Stephen returned distractedly. “I sensed the Mask stir and tried to contain its power but I couldn’t hold it without a spell tailored to its specific characteristics.”

“How long will it take you to write one?”

“I’ll get to it as soon as I’ve cleared out the last of the sprites, sealed all the transdimensional doorways in the tri-state area and had a hot cup of tea,” Stephen returned then ended the call.

Wonderful.

Undeterred by Stephen’s abrupt dismissal, he hit the speed dial button again.

This time Stephen took forty seconds before answering with a sharp, “I’ll get to your petty problem when I have the time!”

“I understand that,” he quickly replied before Stephen could hang up on him again. “I just need to know why the Mask chose me.”

“It didn’t.”

“Meaning Tony did.”

“And to think I used to doubt you were the world’s greatest detective,” Stephen commented dryly then ended the call.

Knowing he wouldn’t get any further with Stephen, he hit the speed dial for the manor.

“Good afternoon, Mr Stark,” Alfred answered warmly on the third ring and he seriously considered throttling Tony the next time he laid eyes on him. “I trust you are well?”

“Yes, fine, Alfred, thank you,” he returned more brusquely than Tony ever would. “Could I speak to Bruce, please?”

“Of course, sir. Just a moment,” Alfred told him and the line went silent except for the lazy beep that sounded every five seconds to let the caller know they hadn’t been cut off.

Thirteen beeps later, Tony answered.

“Hey, Bruce, I was just in--”

“I told you to stay by the phone!”

“The shower. I was only in the shower!”

“The shower is not by the phone and you better not have been masturbating again.”

“That was totally not my fault! I thought it was just some weird, kinky dream.”

“Right.”

“I did! Come on, Bruce, do you really think the first thing I’d do if I thought we’d swapped bodies is cop a quick feel then jerk off?”

“You felt me up too?”

“No! Not really. I mean I-- Okay, I’m going to stop there. Just tell me what Stephen said.”

“He said it’s all your fault. He said you were thinking about me when you touched the Mask and that’s why we swapped bodies,” he paraphrased then waited for Tony’s explosion of denial. But it never came.

“Fuck,” Tony swore softly. “That prehistoric-- Bruce, I swear it was only a passing thought because I don’t remember thinking about you at all. I really don’t. I swear I don’t.”

Okay, he believed Tony, knew Tony would never deliberately try to hurt him and ultimately had nothing to gain from this. But maybe someone else did.

“What about Madame Masque?”

“What about her?”

“I take it you would have been thinking about her most of the time while the Mask was in your possession, so...”

“That backstabbing bitch! Helping her sister my ass. I’m going to strip her secret base back to the Stone Age!”

“Does she even have a sister?”

“Very funny. So what did Stephen say about reversing this?”

“He said he’d get around to it after he’d had some tea.”

“Nice. So you’re thinking he’ll reverse it in what? Four or five hours?”

“At least.”

“Okay, you go eat Steve’s pancakes and I’ll--”

“You’ll go back to bed and speak to Alfred as little as possible. Clark won’t be there until around eight tonight so Stephen should have enough time to fix this without you getting me slung into Arkham.”

“Fine, I’ll stay out everyone’s way until the fix comes through but you’ll have to play nice with Steve in the mean time.”

“Why?”

“Why? What do you mean why? It’s not his fault-- Wait a minute, what did you do when you went into my body that second time?”

“What do you mean?”

“Oh for-- You hit him, didn’t you?”

“Not that hard.”

“Fuck! Go and apologise.”

“He only needed a Band-Aid.”

“He’s bleeding?”

“He’s a super soldier, Tony. I’m sure he gets kicked into walls all the time.”

“You kicked him through a wall?”

“Into a wall. I said into a wall.”

“I don’t care, Bruce! Apologise to him right now.”

“Why don’t we just tell him the truth?”

“What? You want me to tell him over the phone that I screwed up and you ended up in my body while we were having hot morning sex? Yeah, that will go down real well. Then, when Clark hears about it, we can--”

“Okay, fine. I’ll eat the pancakes.”

“And play nice?”

He didn’t respond.

“Come on, Bruce. I’m asking you to do me this one favour. I know none of this is your fault and I’m sorry but it’s not his fault either and it’s really shitty of you to leave him thinking he’s done something wrong, so go fix it. Okay? Bruce?”

“How nice?”

“The usual.”

“Which is?”

“Talking to him, kissing him, hugging him. You do do that stuff with Clark, right?”

“I don’t want to kiss him.”

“For fucksake, Bruce! I’m going to be the one actually kissing him. All you have to do is move my body to do what I’m telling you to do. Think of it as being a middleman. The only rule is you’re not to enjoy it.”

“There’s no chance of that.”

“Then we’ll both be happy.”

“Fine. You can ask Alfred for some painkillers but don’t take more than two.”

“Painkillers?”

“Don’t you have a headache?”

“No, I feel great. And weirdly Zen too.”

“So why do I feel like my brain is trying to bore its way out of my skull?”

“Oh that. You just haven’t had any coffee yet.”

“Coffee? The last time I had a headache like this was in the final stages of radiation poisoning and you’re telling me it’s caffeine withdrawal?”

“Well, my body may be a little dehydrated too but, pretty much, yeah.”

“Health is just a six letter word to you, isn’t it?”

“Oh you’ll be fine after a few mugfuls of the other black gold,” Tony retorted cheerily. “So go on, apologise to Steve, drink your coffee, eat your pancakes and play nice, okay?”

“Fine and you stay in bed.”

“Come on, Bruce. I can’t stay in bed all day.”

“Then go into the library and read for a few hours or go into the cinema room and watch a movie but don’t go down to the cave and don’t talk to anyone.”

“Okay, okay, now apologise to Steve while I’m still on the line so I can hear it worked.”

“It’ll work.”

“So do it.”

“I was going to have a shower first.”

“No, you know the only thing I ever do before coffee is sex, so get going. Go on, apologise to the nice man.”

Hell!

Edging back across the bathroom, he slowly opened the door and peeked into the bedroom. It was empty.

Relieved, he stepped towards the bed and was looking around for Tony’s robe when Tony demanded, “What’s taking so long?”

“I’m looking for something to wear.”

“Forget that. Naked apologies are always better so quit stalling and get my ass into the kitchen.”

“Fine,” he growled then marched across the room, pulled open the bedroom door and stepped into the bright, sunny warmth of the open plan sitting/dining/kitchen area.

He had always liked this part of Tony’s apartment, had always found it comfortingly welcoming, but now it felt like enemy territory. In fact, everything felt like enemy territory and worst of all was Tony’s body. As he walked across the deep pile carpet towards the kitchen, he couldn’t help but notice how short, weak and generally awkward Tony’s body felt, as if all its striated muscles were somehow connected to the bone in all the wrong places.

Damn. On the subject of muscle, there was Steve standing in the kitchen, mixing pancake batter, looking like a solid slab of muscle with muscles. It was a rather emasculating sight. The man weighed at least two hundred and forty pounds and could probably bench press three times that. Of course Clark was a little heavier as well as infinitely stronger, but Steve’s obvious sheer muscle mass was somehow disconcerting when inhabiting Tony’s much slighter body.

“Do you still want pancakes?” Steve said without looking up from the mixing bowl, and he was suddenly reminded of how Steve was once a skinny youth who had been gulled into taking the super soldier serum and that Tony loved him.

“Of course,” he purred, strolling up to Steve in his best ‘love me because I am so lovable’ Tony impersonation. “Especially if I get to kiss you better first.”

“It’s only a scratch,” Steve replied with a dismissive wave at the Band-Aid on his right temple, but Steve’s body still automatically moved to welcome Tony’s approach and it was a simple matter to drape Tony’s arms around Steve’s neck and kiss Steve softly on the mouth.

“Sorry I kicked you,” he then said against Steve’s lips before kissing him again. “Let me make it up to you.”

Putting down the mixing bowl, Steve pulled Tony’s body warmly against him. “You can start by eating all your breakfast then plastering that hole in the wall because I’m not doing it.”

“Sounds fair,” he agreed with another kiss, “but I’ll need you to scrub all the plaster from my hard to reach places when I’m done.”

“Sounds very fair,” Steve returned with a kiss and then Steve was pushing him back against the kitchen counter and deepening the kiss and he didn’t want to take it any further, didn’t want to--

“How many pancakes do you want?” Steve broke the kiss to ask while casually lifting him onto the kitchen counter.

Dumbstruck at the odd move, he stalled for a vital few seconds by kissing Steve again before answering, “Three.”

“Three it is.” Steve smiled then turned to check the heat of the frying pan before picking up the pancake batter again, giving him time to realise that sitting on the counter watching Steve cook was a very Tony thing to do.

“It’s a cinnamon and vanilla batter?” he asked, easing back on the counter and crossing his legs under him while Steve spooned the first lot of pancake mix into the pan.

“You can add the peanut butter when they’re on your plate,” Steve returned good-naturedly before adding low, “and you can end that call anytime now.”

Frowning down at the cell phone he had almost forgotten had been broadcasting their conversation to Tony, he ended the call then put it down on the counter. If Tony wasn’t happy with that apology, he could come over and do it himself.

“Bruce sounded like there was something wrong,” Steve continued, pulling a full mug of coffee out of the espresso machine and handing it to him. “Did you manage to get it sorted out?”

“Fine,” he mumbled into the mug before taking a deep drink of coffee. Ugh! It was Tony’s usual heart attack brew and the unforgiving headache was almost preferable, but Steve was already frowning at him so spitting it out wasn’t really an option. Deciding it was best just to get it over with, he gulped down the rest of the coffee and then handed the empty mug back to Steve.

After dutifully putting the mug back into the espresso machine for a refill, Steve flipped the pancakes then fixed him with a concerned look. “Are you okay?”

“Fine,” he repeated but then couldn’t meet Steve’s gaze anymore, picked up the cellphone and began blindly flicking through Tony’s text messages while Steve busied himself worrying the pancakes.

He had been through all of Tony’s messages twice and was wondering if Steve would notice him going through them for a third time when Steve offered softly, “I could talk to Clark.”

Talk to-- “What?” he snapped back, suddenly irrationally angry as his heart hammered in his ears. “Talk to Clark about what?”

“This! Bruce is--”

“Bruce isn’t doing anything!” he shouted Steve down then jumped off the counter and stepped up close to Steve, was about to continue berating Steve when the kitchen lurched around him, his heartbeat roared in his ears, and then he was half on the floor and half in Steve’s arms as Steve desperately tried to keep him from slipping into unconsciousness.

“Tony! Tony, look at me,” Steve was saying while holding his chin in an almost painfully firm grip. “Your concussion must be worse than we thought. You need to...”

Steve’s voice faded away into darkness and then he was lying on a bed...no, it was a couch and there was green hair-- Joker!

Even while noting the Joker’s inexplicable increase in body mass, he was delivering a carotid artery strike, which he quickly followed with a strike to the Joker’s solar plexus, groin then left knee. The Joker was falling back and he was rolling off the couch to continue his attack when someone tried to grab him from behind.

He knew this second assailant was speaking to him, shouting at him, but he couldn’t hear the words, didn’t need to hear the words, just grabbed the assailant’s wrist and quickly reversed their positions. However, before he could follow through on the wristlock, his assailant reversed the hold and the Joker got up just in time to knock him off balance. Then he was on the floor and they were both on top of him, pinning him down hard, and he couldn’t--

“Tony, stop it! It’s Steve and Leonard. We’re not going to hurt you. No one’s going to hurt you. Calm down and remember--”

The Huehuecoyotl Mask.

He was in Tony’s body because Madame Masque had manipulated Tony into helping her steal the Huehuecoyotl Mask in a bid to steal Tony’s body for half a day. It had just been pure luck, lucky for Tony but unlucky for himself, that Tony had been thinking of him at the crucial moment the spell took hold and not Madame Masque.

“Tony?” Steve was still holding him down, trying to get some sense out of him. “Are you--”

“I remember. Let me up.”

“Not so fast,” Steve returned. “Tell me what happened in the kitchen.”

“I grew dizzy then passed out due to the concussion I sustained in the bedroom.”

“And how did that happen?”

“I fell out of bed onto my head, Steve. Let me up.”

He felt Steve’s weight shift a little on top of him then Leonard Samson said, “As long as he promises not to punch me in the groin again.”

“Sorry, Len. I thought you were someone else,” he sighed as Samson moved away then Steve helped him up.

“Why don’t you take a seat on the couch so I can have a look at you and you can tell me who that someone was,” Samson replied in that ever so reasonable therapist’s tone while fishing a penlight out of his medical bag.

Hating Samson’s tone almost as much as he hated Samson’s ridiculous green hair, he forced himself to sit down on the couch and meet the penlight Samson shone into his eyes with Tony’s most charmingly bemused smile. “I don’t know, Len. A Skrull or a zombie or a zombie Skrull. I guess falling on my head knocked some weird stuff loose.”

“Steve mentioned you were feeling nauseous earlier,” Samson went on while checking his pupil response. “Did you feel nauseous in the kitchen at all?”

“No.”

“Do you feel nauseous now?”

“No.”

“Okay.” Samson turned off the penlight and put it back in his bag. “What about drowsiness? Have you felt sleepy?”

“No,” he answered just as Steve stepped up close and handed him the freshly refilled mug of coffee and he didn’t know which was more disturbing: the prospect of drinking more of Tony’s evil brew or the fact that Steve had left the sitting area and then returned without him noticing. “I’ve got a headache, Len, that’s all,” he said over the rim of his mug before gulping down a mouthful.

“Yes, that’s all, apart from your initial nausea then dizziness, unconsciousness and confusion,” Samson told him as he fought the urge to cringe at the taste of the coffee.

He wasn’t quite sure if he managed to beat the need to cringe showing on Tony’s face but supposed Samson would take it as chagrin as he replied, “Aw, come on, Len. We both know I’ve had worse. I’m fine.”

“Well, there’s every chance you will be if you rest and let Steve keep a close eye on you,” Samson returned, picking up his bag and preparing to leave. “Does that sound reasonable?”

“Sure,” he replied with one of Tony’s cheeky smirks, “I take giving Steve an eyeful very seriously.”

Steve just rolled his eyes then walked Samson over to the apartment’s private elevator. As the doors opened, they started talking quietly and he took that opportunity to abandon the coffee mug on the floor, get up off the couch and head back into the kitchen.

Tony’s cell wasn’t anywhere it reasonably should be.

It wasn’t on the counter or on the floor or under the table, which left only one possibility.

“Looking for this?” Steve said from behind him and he turned around to find Steve standing with the cellphone in one hand and a bathrobe in the other. “What’s going on, Tony? Where were you last night?”

“I already told you,” he hedged while reaching for the cellphone.

“No, you told me you were doing someone a favour,” Steve returned, deliberately handing him the bathrobe and keeping the cellphone out of reach. “Was it Bruce?”

Pulling on the bathrobe to stop himself punching Steve and taking the cellphone, he answered, “No.”

“So where were you?”

Closing his eyes in an attempt to keep his temper, he said nothing.

Silence.

Then Steve stepped up close and he opened his eyes again just as Steve slipped the cellphone into his right hand. “Tony?”

“HYDRA,” he replied hoarsely. “I picked something up from HYDRA’s main storage vault last night. Bruce’s call today was on a related matter we’re still working on but Bruce had nothing to do with me going to the vault.”

He wasn’t surprised when Steve tipped up Tony’s face and kissed him softly on the lips. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

“It should work itself out in a few hours,” he replied, forcing himself to bring his left hand up to cup the right side of Steve’s face then return the kiss. “I just need to talk to Bruce again.”

“Okay.” Steve kissed him once more then eased away. “You sit down at the table and I’ll finish the pancakes.”

“It’s warm outside. I’ll eat on the balcony,” he said, walking out the kitchen then through the apartment while bringing up the manor’s speed dial number.

He was stepping out onto the balcony and the phone had rung once when Tony answered, “Your not-boyfriend must be kinkier than I thought. You never wore clothes this tight when we were together.”

“If they don’t fit you, they’re probably Dick’s.”

“No, they fit all right...but your legs don’t look nearly as long from this angle.”

Walking over to the balcony’s teak table and chair set, he slumped down in the chair nearest the balcony wall and sighed, “What are you doing besides ogling me in the mirror?”

“Eating lunch. Alfred made these--”

“I don’t want to hear it. I just called to make sure you weren’t getting sick.”

“I’m perfect. Why? Are you getting sick?”

Turning his head, he watched a jet shoot over the city skyline. “I’m not sure.”

“What do you mean you’re not sure? You’ve had my body for five minutes, Bruce! What the Hell did you do to it?”

“Nothing directly but I sometimes have a bad reaction to magic.”

“Everyone has a bad reaction to magic.”

“No, I mean that because I tried practicing magic myself, I’ve become hypersensitive to it and often react badly to spells.”

Silence.

“Tony?”

“Are you trying to tell me you’re allergic to magic?”

“Something like that.”

“So what happens? Do you break out in enchanted hives, go into necromanatic shock, what?”

“Judging by previous experience and what has happened so far today, the reaction begins with irritability and emotional instability before graduating into blackouts, hallucinations, panic attacks, seizures and then, most likely, death.”

“Jesus fucking Christ, Bruce! Have you told Stephen?”

“He knows.”

“You’re not up on the roof, are you?”

“I’m on the balcony.”

“Where’s Steve?”

“In the kitchen.”

“Okay, I’m coming over. It’ll take me-- Hey, why don’t you ask Clark to stop by and pick me up?”

“I’m not calling Clark.”

“Yes you are. He’ll get me over there in ten minutes and you’re going to want him there if it gets worse.”

Watching another jet cross the sky in the opposite direction, he said nothing.

“Bruce?”

“Fine. I’ll tell him to collect you. Be ready,” he returned then ended the call.

For a split second, he couldn’t remember Clark’s cellphone number, but then he was dialling it, listening to it ring.

“Clark Kent,” Clark answered melodically on the fifth ring and he couldn’t speak. “Hello?” Clark asked. “Can I help you?”

“It’s me, Clark.”

“Stark? What do you--”

“No, it’s Bruce.”

There was a long pause before Clark asked warily, “What about Bruce?”

“No, Clark, listen to me. There was a magical mask and I’ve swapped bodies with Tony. Stephen Strange is going to reverse the spell but I’m having a bad reaction to it and I need you to bring Tony to Stark Tower so he can explain what happened to Steve and don’t even try asking me to prove I’m Bruce because then I will put synthetic white kryptonite in your milk and I can guarantee you won’t find it sexy.”

“Wha-- I don’t--”

“Just get over here, Clark,” he hissed then hung up a split second before Steve stepped out onto the balcony with a plate of pancakes in each hand and a jar of peanut butter under one arm.

“It’s really brightened up,” Steve said, walking up to the table. “There was quite a thick mist when I was running in the park this morning.”

Sitting up in his chair, he nodded his thanks at the pancakes Steve put down in front of him, picked up the fork from the side of the plate and started eating, uncaring that the pancakes were dressed only in butter and maple syrup.

“I did bring the peanut butter,” Steve added low while placing the jar and his own pancakes on the table before sitting down.

He knew Tony would have cracked some joke about saving the peanut butter to eat off Steve later but he didn’t want to be Tony anymore, didn’t want to be here anymore, just ate his pancakes in silence. Steve, however, had other ideas.

“So are you going to tell me what the problem is?” Steve asked after eating his first mouthful of pancake. “Or is it a secret only billionaire geniuses are allowed to know?”

He didn’t want to speak to Steve, didn’t even want to look at Steve, but forced himself to answer, “Bruce will explain it.”

“Bruce...you mean Bruce is coming here? Now?” Steve returned angrily. “Why?”

“To explain what happened!” he snapped back. “Did you even finish high school?”

“Clearly not as well as you finished jackass school. You know I want to hear it from you, not Bruce!”

Deciding he’d already said enough, he pushed back his chair to leave, but Steve pinned his right forearm to the table before he could stand up.

“I don’t--” Steve started saying but he wasn’t listening, couldn’t hear for the sound of his blood raging furiously in his ears. Then he had upturned the table and had Steve pinned to the wall with a chair before the plates had finished smashing on the floor.

Magic. He knew it was the magic that was making him unbalanced, making him lose control, knew the undisciplined nature of Tony’s body was making it even more difficult for him to cope, but pinning Steve, dominating Steve, hurting Steve still felt-- No. As he looked into Steve’s eyes, he knew Steve wasn’t trying to hurt Tony, wasn’t trying to hurt anyone, and the need to lash out faded.

“I,” he began, but couldn’t continue, couldn’t explain, just stepped back and lowered the chair away from Steve, let it slip from his fingers to the floor. “I’m...shower,” he managed to get out before turning away, leaving Steve standing against the wall as he walked back inside.

He had every intention of walking through into the bathroom and taking that shower but somehow found himself walking in the opposite direction and felt no need to change his course. Then he was at the elevator doors, stepping into the elevator, riding the elevator down to Tony’s workshop in the basement of the building.

Part of him knew he shouldn’t be doing this, but he had to escape, had to fight. When the elevator reached the basement, he strode out without hesitation, headed straight to the secure room at the back of the workshop. He should have been unsure, should have had second thoughts as he opened Tony’s suit cabinet. He didn’t. Seconds later, he was wearing the Iron Man suit and the faceplate was slipping down over his eyes.

For all their complexity, the control and display units of the suit were elegantly simple to use and he had orientated himself in just a few moments, was flying out through the basement’s garage door less than a minute after entering the workshop.

The sky above New York was a bright, clear blue but there was a dark bank of cloud closing in from the Atlantic. Looping around to get a better feel for the flight stabilisers, he accessed the current coordinates of Madame Masque’s ocean base and then headed off into the cloudbank, turning off the comm unit so Steve couldn’t contact him.

At top speed, he reached the base in less than ten minutes. It was then a simple matter of analysing the readings, locating the generator room then ploughing straight down through the layers of steel into it.

Alarms were going off all over the base by the time he landed on the generator room floor.

He had hacked into the control panel and was reviewing the base’s power schematics and evacuation procedure when the security door behind him opened and six men and one woman strode into the room.

“Tony, darling, what a generous surprise, but you could have knocked first,” Madame Masque purred and he turned to face her, found himself looking down the barrels of seven plasma rifles.

“Generous?” he queried in Iron Man’s deep, metallic voice.

“Why of course,” she returned, then opened fire.

The first few bolts from the plasma rifles had minimal effect on the suit, but he still staggered back against the control panel and ‘accidentally’ smashed the display screens. Seeing this weakness, the goons redoubled their efforts, fired at him rapidly and haphazardly as he took to the air...flying in front of the control gauges on each of the four power generators in turn.

“No, you fools, stop!” Madame Masque shouted as the generators began to falter then overheat under the hail of plasma bolts. “I SAID STOP!” she bellowed, viciously hitting the nearest goons in the face and groin with the butt of her plasma rifle. Whether they realised their mistake or just didn’t want to get pummelled by their boss, the remaining goons stopped firing. But it was too late. Three of the four generators had ruptured and the fourth was in danger of exploding.

“Evacuate! EVACUATE!” Madame Masque ordered, shoving her woefully incompetent goons out of the control room just as the evacuation sirens began wailing.

“If those were your best men, your organisation is in more trouble than you think,” he called over while manually turning the release valve on the fourth power generator.

He’d barely finished turning the valve so the generator wouldn’t explode when Madame Masque let out a furious scream and opened fire on him. Whether she was a much better shot than her men or just knew the best places to aim for on Tony’s weakened suit he couldn’t tell for sure but, as the suit’s circuitry began to overheat under a slew of perfectly targeted plasma bolts, he knew he had to get out of there and quickly exited the way he’d entered.

From five hundred feet above the base, he watched the evacuation progress, kept a careful eye on the area to make sure Madame Masque and all her goons escaped with their lives but little else. He was watching the deserted base slowly sink beneath the waves when Clark flew up to hover beside him.

“Namor’s going to have a few words to say to Stark about that,” Clark commented softly on the sinking base before giving him a sideways look. “Are you okay? I mean in the suit not in-- I can see it’s overheating.”

“I’m fine. Did you drop Tony off?”

“I left him with Steve. He was...we should probably be getting back there, make sure everything is...fine.”

“Fine,” he said, turning and looking Clark straight in the eye. “Can you give me a ride?”

“Uh...sure.” Clark hesitated then turned around so he could wrap his arms around Clark’s neck from behind. “I guess it’s best not to overtax the suit.”

“No, its fully functional,” he corrected while securing his hold on Clark then cutting the suit’s thrusters and resting his helmeted head against the soft curls on the back of Clark’s head. “It’s just a lot slower than you and for once I’d like to experience just how fast you can go.”

“Oh. Okay then,” Clark returned with a smile in his voice and then they shot off across the sky.

He didn’t know if Clark was flying at his top speed, or anything even close to it, but the suit’s environmental analysis units couldn’t keep up with their rapidly changing coordinates and they’d passed New York and were heading out over the Great Lakes mere seconds after being three hundred miles out in the Atlantic.

“How much can you see?” Clark called out to him as they flew over Iowa.

“Just about keeping track of the states,” he called back over Kansas and then they were heading out over the deserts of Colorado, Utah and Nevada towards the Pacific.

“This is the loop I usually take,” Clark said as the vast blue of the ocean opened up below and ahead of them. “Is there any route you’d like to go?”

“No. This is fine,” he answered, wondering how many times Clark did his ‘usual loop’ a day.

As the Pacific came to a peaceful close with the setting sun, he noticed Clark slowing down slightly over Osaka and then Shanghai as if listening to the people below. Then they were flying over Delhi and then Tehran to catch up with the sun over Cairo before flying over the Sahara to Lagos. From there, they flew up the African coast to Morocco and landed in a wheat field a few miles east of Casablanca.

“You can buy the best stuffed bread from the market in a little village just down the road there,” Clark told him with a nod to the southwest as he released his hold on Clark and stepped away. “Maybe I’ll bring you some next time I go.”

“Why don’t you bring me some now?” he returned, sitting down in the wheat and taking off the suit’s heavy helmet and gauntlets. “Go on, Clark,” he pushed when Clark just stood there frowning down at him. “I’ll still be here when you get back.”

“Right.” Clark gave him a dubious look then took to the sky to fly southwest at an extremely leisurely thirty miles an hour.

As soon as Clark was out of sight, he closed his eyes and listened to the world around him, let his mind follow the path of the breeze as it caressed the wheat then rose up under the wings of the Egyptian Geese displaying loudly in the northern corner of the field. After a minute, he could hear more than just the breeze and the geese, opened his eyes to find a young rabbit sniffing at him intently from the safety of the wheat curtain. Then, a moment later, the rabbit’s left ear flicked back and it bolted off a split second before Clark flew up to land beside him again.

“If your long-eared friend knew how good this bread was he would have stayed to have some,” Clark said, sitting down in the wheat and handing him half of the still warm, herb flatbread he’d brought back. Judging by the scent, the bread was stuffed with parsley, cumin, paprika and ginger. His first bite told him he was right and that Clark was right too: the bread was one of the best he’d tasted.

They ate in silence with Clark avoiding his gaze.

When they’d finished eating, he finally forced Clark to look him in the eye by saying, “Yes I kissed Steve for Tony but Steve doesn’t need to know that.”

“He-- Tony made you kiss Steve?”

“Well I didn’t volunteer to do it.”

“No, I mean why? Apart from the fact that Stark is a perverted little letch.”

“It wasn’t like that, Clark.”

“No? Then what was it like?”

“It was...”

“It was?”

“Complicated.”

“I think my brain can cope.”

“Fine. The second time we switched bodies, Tony and Steve were having sex and I kicked Steve into the bedroom wall.”

“You...they...” Clark stood up to stomp some wheat into submission then growl down at him, “You had to tell me that?”

“You asked and I don’t know why you’re so upset. I’m the one who ended up with Captain America’s--”

“Okay!” Clark waved him into silence. “I don’t need to hear it. I can’t...” Clark trailed off then gave him an uncomfortable look. “Are you, I mean, how do you feel about it?”

“I’ll get over it,” he sighed, leaving the gauntlets and helmet on the ground and standing up to step close to Clark and--

“I’m sorry.” Clark stepped back from him raising his hands. “It’s just...I want to touch you, I do, but everything in me is telling me that it isn’t you and I can’t get over that. I can’t. So let’s just get back to New York so I can chase up Strange and get this sorted out, okay?”

Gently capturing Clark’s hands in his own, he pressed up close against Clark then trapped Clark’s hands between their bodies and cupped Clark’s face in his hands, kissed Clark softly on the mouth then whispered against Clark’s lips, “It’s still me, Clark. It’s always me.”

He wasn’t sure what changed but there was a sudden shift within Clark and then Clark was pulling him into a desperate embrace, a breathless kiss and-- Steve. He was in Tony’s kitchen kissing Steve.

After a second staring dumbly into each other’s eyes in frozen shock, they broke apart wiping their mouths.

“I knew that was a bad idea!” Steve growled. “That is the last time I ever let him talk me into that.”

Although he was immensely glad to be in his own body, wiping his own mouth with his own hand, even if his upper body was constrained in the tight confines of Dick’s ‘Hudson U’ t-shirt that Tony had somehow managed to wriggle him into, he couldn’t help but give Steve a suspicious glare. “Tony’s made a habit out of kissing you while in someone else’s body?”

“Uh...I need a drink,” Steve said, turning to the espresso machine. “Can I get you something?”

Home. He wanted to go home, wanted to climb back into bed and pretend the last few hours never happened. He didn’t think it was too much to ask but, unfortunately, he wasn’t going to get it so he just said, “A t-shirt that doesn’t cut off my circulation would be useful,” while peeling Dick’s t-shirt off over his head.

“Sure.” Steve took two mugs of coffee out of the espresso machine and put them down on the counter. “Give me a second.”

As Steve went off to find him something to wear, he walked over to the counter, picked up the nearest mug of coffee and poured three quarters of its contents down the sink before topping it up with hot water from the espresso machine.

“This should fit you,” Steve said, walking back into the kitchen, and he turned around to find Steve holding a certain blue t-shirt out to him.

“You have got to be kidding me,” he automatically responded.

“That’s what I said when Carol gave it to me.” Steve handed him the t-shirt then picked the other mug of coffee up off the counter. “At least it will cheer Clark up.”

Supposing Steve was right, he put his coffee and Dick’s t-shirt down on the kitchen table and then pulled on the Superman t-shirt. Okay, now he felt like an idiot...and Steve’s grin wasn't helping matters.

“Sorry,” Steve apologised at his glare, “but at least it fits you.”

Not wanting to encourage any more conversation, he picked up Dick’s t-shirt and his mug and drank in silence.

He had finished his coffee and was just handing the empty mug to Steve to wash in the sink when Clark and Tony landed on the balcony.

“I bet you didn’t pull my arm out of the socket when it was Bruce’s,” Tony complained at Clark while walking across the apartment towards the couch carefully rotating his right shoulder.

“What happened?” Steve strode over to join Tony at the couch. “Are you okay?”

“I was fine until super muscle head here dragged me back to New York at Mach 9,” Tony growled, tossing his helmet then gauntlets down on the couch.

“No, I mean your suit,” Steve returned, staring at the dents, scars and warped paint. “Did you--”

“Oh, that was Bruce,” Tony snapped while continuing to strip. “After telling me I couldn’t even glance at his toys sideways, he steals my suit and lets Whitney take potshots at it while he sinks her secret base.”

Dragging his gaze away from an irate and increasingly naked Tony, Steve gave him a surprised look. “You sank her secret base?”

“It’s more of a secret now,” he answered, ignoring Clark until Clark walked around him and hugged him from behind.

“Time to leave,” Clark told with a kiss by his ear.

“Yeah, go,” Tony called over bad-temperedly while stripping off the last of his suit, “but be back here on Friday to help me fix this mess because--”

Tony’s sentence was cut off by Steve’s kiss, but he wasn’t really listening anyway because Clark was turning him around, pulling him into a warm embrace and an even warmer kiss. Then Clark was holding him closer and they were flying out of Tony’s apartment into the clear blue sky.

They were kissing lazily over Staten Island when Clark smiled and said, “I like your new dress code.”

“Shut up and kiss me, Clark.”

 

 

End


End file.
